


A Close Encounter

by dsa_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, due South
Genre: Crossover, Drama, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-03-30
Updated: 2006-03-30
Packaged: 2018-11-11 02:46:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11139585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dsa_archivist/pseuds/dsa_archivist
Summary: When he was ten years old, Ray Kowalski was abducted by aliens.





	A Close Encounter

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Speranza, the archivist: this story was once archived at [Due South Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Due_South_Archive). To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in June 2017. I tried to reach out to all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Due South Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/duesoutharchive).

A Close Encounter

## A Close Encounter

  
by Lady Mondegreen  


Disclaimer: I don't own Due South, nor am I JK Rowling, I'm sorry to say. 

Story Notes: Crossover with Harry Potter.

* * *

It was sheer dumb luck that led to Ray Kowalski meeting a wizard in the English countryside.   
  
It was also something like luck that led to his being in England in the first place. A few months ago a letter had arrived from his grandmother, his mum's mother, who he'd never met, inviting the family to visit her. This had led to a couple of loud arguments between his dad, who didn't like the old lady, and his mum, who did, but arguments weren't really a rare thing in the Kowalski household so Ray didn't bother much about them. Then there was a week or two of silence, when his dad didn't speak to his mum, or really to anyone, which wasn't all that strange, but his mum wasn't speaking much to anyone either, and since his mum could talk holy hell about anything to anybody, Ray found her silence especially troublesome. So, apparently, did his dad, since it wasn't too long after that that Damien Kowalski announced that this year, their summer vacation would be spent in England.   
  
Ray didn't know much about England. He knew it was somewhere across the ocean (though which ocean, he couldn't exactly say) and that at some point or other America had kicked its royal ass in a war (though what war, he couldn't say, either. It hadn't been dad's war, Korea, and all the others were so far in Ray's ancient history, way before he was born, that they didn't much matter to his ten-year-old brain). He could probably ask his brother: Marlon was twelve, and claimed to have actually kissed a girl once, and would probably know all about England and the war (the latter being a much more interesting topic to a young boy), but Marlon was still mad because Ray had broken his best cap gun playing Bank Robber and consequently any conversation with his brother these days involved the word 'dipwad' a lot, so Ray decided he was just better off not knowing much about England after all.   
  
That had turned out to be a bad idea, though, once he'd actually found himself in this new place where everyone talked funny and ate funny food and people drove on the wrong frickin' side of the streets and there were sheep everywhere and, just maybe, when his mum had told him not to wander off too far from his grandmother's house, Ray should probably have listened.   
  
But his grandmother had a huge back yard with trees and an honest-to-god stream in it, which he'd followed, hoping to catch a glimpse of some exotic English fish, or better yet an English turtle, or maybe a glint of treasure. After all, some of the people around here talked an awful lot like some of the pirates he'd seen in movies (and he could swear he'd seen a man with a peg-leg, once, in the village down the road), and where there were pirates, there was bound to be treasure.   
  
He walked long into the sunny afternoon, until he got bored with the stream and wandered off in search of sheep. Sheep weren't turtles, but they were cool. He was standing on the edge of a meadow, on the other side of which ran a low stone wall. He thought he could hear faint bleats from behind it, so he headed off in that direction. As he neared the wall, he was startled to see a man sitting on the ground, leaning against the stones, his dark clothes and hair blending in so that Ray could barely see him.   
  
"Hello, there," the man said in a friendly way.   
  
"Hi," Ray answered, uncertainly.   
  
"Were you looking for anything in particular, or just exploring?"   
  
"Sheep," Ray stated.   
  
The man sighed. "I'm afraid they've passed on," he said mildly, indicating the wall behind him with a wave of his hand.   
  
Ray was sure that he could climb the wall easily enough, though something in the man's voice made Ray think for a moment that he really didn't want to see what might be on the other side.   
  
"Are you a shepherd?" he asked instead, feeling that he ought to say something to the man and, after all, he seemed to know a lot about the sheep.   
  
The man smiled a little. "A shepherd? No, not quite. Not yet. I'm still waiting for my sheep to come to me, actually."   
  
A sliver of some old nursery rhyme popped into his head, 'leave them alone, and they'll come home', and Ray shot the man a look of childish contempt. "That's stupid. You don't wait for sheep, you have to go find them yourself."   
  
"Indeed," said the man, seeming unconcerned with being called 'stupid' by a child. He looked intently at Ray. "What is your name, boy?"   
  
It was on the tip of his tongue to answer 'Stanley Raymond Kowalski', as his mother had drilled into him for as long as he could remember, but 'Stanley' was such a sissy name. "Ray," he said defiantly. "Ray Kowalski."   
  
"Greetings, Ray. My name is Tom. Where are you from?"   
  
"Chicago, Illinois," Ray answered, promptly and proudly.   
  
"And how old are you?"   
  
"Ten and a half." Well, ten and two months, but the guy wouldn't know if Ray fudged a little.   
  
"And have you received your letter yet?"   
  
Ray blinked. "What?"   
  
"A letter, from your school."   
  
Ray shook his head, uncertainly. The only kind of letter he got from school were report cards (bad) and notes from his teacher to his parents (even worse), neither of which he wanted to discuss with this English stranger.   
  
The man smiled again. He whispered something that sounded a bit like 'muddle', and Ray felt suddenly uneasy.   
  
"I have to get back," he said. "Mum's gonna kill me."   
  
"Oh, no, Ray," Tom said, looking at his watch. It was a strange watch, with no numbers on it, but then maybe they told time differently in this part of the world. "You have a little time left before you have to start worrying about infanticide."   
  
It was on the tip of Ray's tongue to ask what 'infanticide' meant, but his feeling of uneasiness was growing. "I really gotta go."   
  
"Well, if you're certain," Tom said, getting to his feet and holding out his hand to Ray. "It was a pleasure meeting you, Ray Kowalski from Chicago."   
  
Ray eyed the man's hand suspiciously, but reached out to shake it nonetheless. As their hands touched, though, the man whispered `Imperio' and Ray felt a jolt of _something_ go through him. He noted vaguely that the man held a wooden stick in his other hand.   
  
"What a shame," Tom was saying sadly, "that you appear to have lost your way. Perhaps if you come with me, I might help you find it. But first, you must help me find my sheep."   
  
"Okay," Ray said amenably, and tightened his grip on Tom's hand as the man helped him over the wall. The field beyond it was empty; the sheep were indeed gone. Then Tom looked around, pulled Ray in close, and with a loud CRACK they were gone, too.   
  
Ray found himself in a small cottage with no real idea as to how he got there. The room around him was bare except for a small table and a cold stone fireplace.   
  
"You will sit on the table," said Tom, who waved his stick and said, "Incendio." Ray blinked as a roaring fire suddenly appeared in the hearth. Tom moved to the room's only window and drew a thick curtain across it. "Now," he added sharply.   
  
Ray clambered onto the table. Something in him, some small voice in the back of his head was protesting, screaming at him that this was wrong, that he shouldn't be here, that his parents would be worrying, but that voice was drowned out by another which sounded an awful lot like Tom's and which was telling him not to be a coward and to Do What He Was Told. Ray, not being particularly used to obeying authority figures, found this to be a novel experience as he sat on the table, waiting for further instructions.   
  
"Take off your shirt."   
  
Ray had heard stories, hinted warnings by his parents, about grownups who did things to children, and he thought that taking his clothes off might be somehow related to that, but really, it was just his shirt, what harm could it do?   
  
"Good boy," said Tom as Ray stripped the shirt from his scrawny chest, shivering a little in the cool room. "Now lie down."   
  
Despite the voice in the back of his head, which was now screaming at him to GET AWAY, he swung his legs up on the table and lay back. Tom waved his hand and ropes suddenly shot up around Ray, tying him tightly to the table. Tom was in his mind again, telling him not to worry, and Ray didn't. Not yet, at any rate.   
  
Tom was approaching him, now, and Ray was vaguely alarmed at the long silver knife in the man's hand. "For the first part of the ritual," he was saying, "blood must be freely given by the victim. Will you give me yours freely, Ray?"   
  
Ray felt himself nod. "Sure."   
  
Tom drew the knife sharply down the length of Ray's arm; Ray hissed in a breath at the sudden, bright flash of pain. Tom held something up - a silver cup - and caught a few drops of Ray's blood in it.   
  
"Very good," he murmured. He turned to the fire, and Ray saw that a cauldron had been placed on the flames. Tom poured the blood into it, along with some strong-smelling leaves and what looked like some kind of animal part that Ray didn't want to look too closely at.   
  
"And now, Ray," Tom said, turning back to him, and Ray saw with horrified fascination that the man's eyes now had a reddish tinge to them, "I shall remove the Imperius curse from your mind. Your ... willing ... participation is no longer needed."   
  
The presence was suddenly gone from Ray's head and panic flew in full force to replace it. Ray screamed, struggling against the ropes binding him, but they gave him no slack and he was powerless under Tom's watchful glare.   
  
"Now, my young Muggle, I have further use for you." Tom lifted the knife again. "Please, feel free to fight me. Fear is a powerful element in the ritual, and yours shall make me very strong indeed. Strong enough to finally gather my sheep - my flock of loyal servants - to me once and for all."   
  
Ray saw the knife coming towards him, saw the point of it, razor-sharp, heading for his chest, straight for where his heart was beating wildly. "No..." he whimpered, shutting his eyes tightly, waiting for the pain that he was sure was about to hit him. Pain which was taking an awfully long time to arrive...   
  
Still trembling with terror, Ray opened his eyes. Tom was standing completely still, his head cocked as if he was listening to something. Suddenly, his eyes narrowed and, with a curse, he spun away from Ray. He flew around the room gathering up his things, the cauldron, the knife, the silver cup, and with a CRACK he was gone.   
  
Ray lay in stunned silence, terrified tears streaming from his eyes, his chest heaving with sobs he didn't dare let out. There was a shuffling noise outside the cottage, and Ray wondered if he'd been saved from Tom only to die of fright here on this table.   
  
He heard voices now, rough male voices, and footsteps, though there was an odd thumping noise too that he couldn't quite place. Suddenly, a face appeared above his own and he flinched.   
  
"What've we got here?" the man said gently.   
  
Ray stared up at the man, unable to speak. He felt the ropes being cut from his arms and legs, and strong hands were helping him sit up.   
  
"Who did this to you, lad?" a second man asked him. Ray stared at him - it was the pirate he'd seen in the village, peg leg and all. "C'mon, boy, speak!"   
  
"Alastor," the first man said sternly. "Give him a moment." He turned back to Ray. "You wouldn't be young Ray Kowalski, would you?"   
  
Ray nodded. He seemed to be getting his strength back; his hands had almost stopped shaking.   
  
"Your gran's been worried sick about you; she owled us as soon as you went missing. Come on, we'll take you back to her."   
  
The other man, Alastor, cleared his throat loudly. The first man sighed. "Can you tell me what happened, Ray?"   
  
Ray's eyes narrowed as he tried to make some sense of the past few hours. "Some guy named Tom took me; he said he was looking for sheep. He brought me here and tied me up and cut my arm..." he glanced down at the arm in question, expecting to see a long bloody gash, but to his amazement the skin was unbroken. He looked up at Alastor, who was tucking a stick of his own under his long cloak.   
  
"Right," Alastor said. "Probably won't get much more out of him."   
  
"Agreed," the first man said. He reached down to the table and picked Ray up in his arms; Ray, still feeling dazed, let him. Before he could blink, they were in his grandmother's kitchen.   
  
"RAY!" several voices cried out, and he was torn out of the man's arms and into his mum's, his grandmother hovering anxiously beside the two of them. "Thank Heaven you're safe!"   
  
The two men were talking to his grandmother now; they seemed to know her, and she was nodding at something one of them had said. Ray made out the words, "He'll have to be obliviated, of course," before his grandmother shushed the men and came back towards him.   
  
"The aurors will see to it that he's all right, Barbara," she said to his mum, who nodded worriedly. "We can't tell Damien, of course. When he gets back with the search party, we'll have to tell him that Ray came home on his own."   
  
"All right," his mum said softly. Before Ray could ask what was going on, Alastor had joined them.   
  
"Don't worry, lass," he told Ray's mum. "He won't remember a thing. Or he'll think it was all a bad dream."   
  
Ray opened his mouth to tell them that there was no way in heck he'd ever forget what had happened when --   
  
\-- the sunlight hit his eyes and he blinked them open, snuggling deeper under his blankets. His mom was at the door to the room he shared with his brother, who was still snoring away in the other bed. "Good morning, sleepyhead," she said with a smile.   
  
"Mum!" he said excitedly. "I had the wildest dream! I was... there was..." He tried to remember. Something about red eyes, and sheep, and - of course! "I was abducted by aliens, Mum! Swear to God!"   
  
His mother raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Were you, now?"   
  
"Yup!"   
  
"Well," she conceded with a laugh. "Why don't you come downstairs and tell your gran and me about it over pancakes?"   
  
And Ray Kowalski, in his too-big pajamas, did just that.   
  


  
 

* * *

End A Close Encounter by Lady Mondegreen 

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